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Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

683 points by zhuxuefeng1994 11y ago

zaczac 11y ago
google is the biggest ads app. how funny
cm2187 11y ago
I can't resist mentioning that one of the greatest offenders is news.google.com
teaneedz 11y ago
Can't wait to see the Yahoo! interstitial news app go away or at least stop hijacking the whole screen.
titfn 11y ago
How many years did it take for Google to react to this?
mada299 11y ago
I think it's interesting that they are making this decision - one that clearly pushed users to stay on the mobile web which is beneficial for Google - based on a study that was pretty flawed. This article debunks their methodology pretty well: https://medium.com/@alexaustin/just-because-it-s-google-doesn-t-mean-it-s-right-5fe27b912f28 https://medium.com/@alexaustin/just-because-it-s-google-does...
- Filligree 11y ago
  Hush, don't tell them--they might decide not to do it.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - mada299 11y ago
    I built an app without having a website before so I get the perspective of the app developer here too - trying to get people to their app. But I agree that interstitials is not the answer. We ended up building mobile app content previews (deepviews) for all the apps using our deeplinks (I work for Branch.io) which work much better.
- EricBurnett 11y ago
  Thanks for the link, that's a nice critique. That said, much of their arguments don't apply here. The article take the publisher's ("businesses") perspective, but that's not consistent with a search engine in this case - the original study is more accurate from the perspective of optimizing for the search user. The business wants to convert low-value mobile users into high-value app installers, and would happily sacrifice most to get a few installs if that's net positive on long-term value. The search engine, on the other hand, wants as many users as possible to be successful in finding what they're looking for. These perspectives are not aligned - high abandonment rates due to interstitials can be fine for the business, yet penalized as destinations from a search engine. The underlying question is who Google optimizes for in this case, the user or the destination.
  - mada299 11y ago
    Hi Eric, good points. But what about the case in which what a user is looking for is actually inside the app? More of mobile traffic is moving into apps - shouldn't we find ways to also index and show content as well?
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
rubyn00bie 11y ago
tldr; Cool... but shouldn't google stop policing the internet and abusing, what some might call, monopoly powers for trivial gains. ====== I'd be willing to bet, this will one day be in an FTC/DOJ report about monopoly practices at Google... Google seems to have forgotten they don't want to be looked at as a monopoly or abusing their power for the small things. While this is consumer friendly, at least at first glance, I still find it anti-competitive and generally worthless exertion of their near monopoly power. It also effects them quite heavily (GMail being my prime example). If I had to guess, this is a decision by someone who is lacking the resources to fully grasp the decision and potential long term ramifications of their action. Maybe they do, but for a company of their size this seems petty. The potential anti-trust lawsuit however will not be petty.
- markdown 11y ago
  This is like a television service provider pledging to give their customers (who want high quality tv shows) more high quality tv shows and less shitty shows.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  This isn't an anti-trust issue. Google's not using its market dominance to move into a new market. It's more like a common practice by retailers: using their market share to force changes by their suppliers. For example, Tesco (the largest UK supermarket) recently banned certain sugary drinks targeted at children.
  - kuschku 11y ago
    But Google is, even today still using these same interstitial ads for Gmail. That means it will most likely end up in some antitrust trial.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      Or Google will stop doing it before it starts applying the penalty. Or Google Search will penalize other Google sites that use those ads. It wouldn't be the first time Google-owned sites have run afoul of Google Search penalties.
bradgessler 11y ago
Content publishers have created a really bad situation for themselves on the web from these types of ads, slow Javascripts, and other "ad tech" excesses. Apple is responding with ad blocking technology and a news app. Facebook has responded with articles that load quickly from their apps. These solutions represent an existential threat to the open web, and therefore Google. I really hope Google doesn't just stop at app ads, and starts punishing websites that do objectively horrible things to end-user experience.
dssddsds 11y ago
Isn't this a tiny bit concerning that one company can effectively force the web to comply with their standards by "punishing" any non-conformers? I know Bing exists, but still, this is something that would happen in a monopoly.
- exodust 11y ago
  When 100% of people find those intrusive pop-ups annoying, the "standard" then is not so much belonging to Google, but shared by all.
antr 11y ago
Finally, I hope those sites don't even make it to the first serp.
thebokehwokeh2 11y ago
They're looking at you http://www.ultimate-guitar.com http://www.ultimate-guitar.com
- benbristow 11y ago
  That website looks so dated nowadays. Really needs a revamp.
  - oaktowner 11y ago
    Probably because they've been putting all of their resources into the app which they advertise so annoyingly.
    - rhizome 11y ago
      Also probably because like Spotify, they are paying every penny they get for royalties.
- Mahn 11y ago
  As a beginner guitarist, this is site is the worst. It's a shame that honest sites like olga.net don't exist anymore.
  - jnevill 11y ago
    Oh man I miss olga. I had completely forgotten about it. These "newer" sites are the pits and every single one of them does this BS app install crap. Thank goodness for the "View as desktop" button in mobile browsers.
    - tajen 11y ago
      Do we have an idea about their business model? How much do they pay the music labels for the right to display half-quality tabs? I've always assumed the labels asking for money were the reason why there was so much advertising on those sites and why no plain-text site ever survived.
alexbilbie 11y ago
I hope they also stop serving adverts that redirect from Safari to the App Store too
- wlesieutre 11y ago
  I thought Safari doesn't even allow this anymore because of all the popup forwarder spam?
  - alexbilbie 11y ago
    I still experience it every so often (iOS 8.4.1). The last time it happened it was on Techcrunch
    - wlesieutre 11y ago
      I see. Looks like they were at least to be blocked, but the system either wasn't shipped or doesn't work reliably. http://sentrant.com/2015/03/12/safari-to-app-store-redirect-from-ad-on-ios-8-2/ http://sentrant.com/2015/03/12/safari-to-app-store-redirect-...
  - twoodfin 11y ago
    UIWebView is definitely still vulnerable, as I've seen it when browsing sites through the default Twitter iOS client. Not as frequently as in the past, however.
- jakejake 11y ago
  Facebook links used to be so bad with this until they changed something in the built-in browser to catch them. Now every time I get a "this page is trying to leave the app" confirmation box I feel extremely satisfied that the redirect was squashed.
nilved 11y ago
What about sites that prompt you to enable push notifications?
- jasonlotito 11y ago
  That is a feature of the browser, and is on the browser to make it not annoying. While it's fair to say you might find it annoying and might not want to see it, others do find it valuable. If a browser feature is annoying you, the correct approach would be to disable that feature in the browser. If the browser doesn't allow you to do this, than it's the browser's implementation that is at fault. This all assumes the site is using the features the browser makers are telling the sites to use.
  - pdkl95 11y ago
    The correct answer is that features like push notifications should be opt-in in the browser. Too many of these features exploit the general ignorance of users. > If a browser feature is annoying you, the correct approach would be to disable that feature in the browser. Yet when some of us shut off Javascript - a feature that is often annoying, enables many kinds of tracking, and occasionally creates serious security problems - half of HN freaks out. Given that Javascript is necessary for many types of surveillance-as-a-business-model, hostility to the idea of disabling javascript is expected. Push notifications are still a newer feature, but once that feature becomes entrenched enough that some people's profit depends on the feature, disabling push notifications in the client will be regarded with similar hostility.
    - jasonlotito 11y ago
      > The correct answer is that features like push notifications should be opt-in in the browser. They are. They are completely opt-in. You don't get push notifications unless you ask for them.
Aldo_MX 11y ago
And when will they punish advertisements that redirect to app stores? or even worse, websites that activate WAP subscriptions...
tbranyen 11y ago
I read this as publishing and was getting mad, then I read the article and smiled. Thanks Google! I absolutely hate sites that do this.
ianphughes 11y ago
I still do not understand the popularity of this approach. It seems to crazy increase bounce rates. You would think that negative user behavior would already make these undesirable without Google being explicit?
- rasz_pl 11y ago
  Works the same as nigerian prince stories - it filters out smart people and leaves you with suckers.
- s3r3nity 11y ago
  As someone working in tech, and does digital marketing consulting, there is actually a lot of value in these interstitials: 1) Usually the app is infinitely better than the mobile web experience. You can chalk it up to prioritization of engineering working on iOS / Android app development over a mobile web experience -- usually for good reason. 2) It's a solid retention strategy. You can harp on about bounce rates reducing activation rates (bounce rates aren't as high as you might think btw in certain cases) but at the end of the day, a 1% increase in repeat purchase rate (or insert other retention metric here) will have a much much more significant impact than a 1% increase in activation. It only works for certain scenarios and cases, but at the end of the day, there's significant data to show that they work.
  - roasm 11y ago
    I generally agree with these points. We ended up with an interstitial the same way I hope most everyone else did: we A/B tested it, and the results were clearly positive on engagement and purchase. We could choose to drop the interstitial as a matter of principal or on the assumption that the difficult-to-quantify long-term benefit will pay off later, but we'd have to make that decision not in the absence of data, but actually in opposition to the data. Or let Google make the decision for us...
  - ianphughes 11y ago
    I am not sure I agree with your first point. It seems the most frequent case is that a user wants to access content right away. Regardless of how much "better" the native experience might be, its a lot of hoops to jump through to fulfill the immediate need. I certainly can't argue that it does yield positive business results under certain scenarios, but for the average user it seems to injure common web experiences.
justincormack 11y ago
Does this apply to "please subscribe to our stupid newsletter" that obscures many sites now?
- sgustard 11y ago
  Per http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/09/mobile-friendly-web-pages-using-app.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/09/mobile-fr... "After November 1, mobile web pages that show an app install interstitial that hides a significant amount of content on the transition from the search result page will no longer be considered mobile-friendly. This does not affect other types of interstitials." This implies the answer is No, since that's another type of interstitial (not an app install) -- but is one that blocks most of the page content. It's curious that they're analyzing the nature of the popup closely enough to determine that.
  - jfoster 11y ago
    Perhaps they're approximating by analyzing the page as a mobile user agent and a non-mobile user agent, then comparing.
    - rhizome 11y ago
      They know what the content is, so they can probably analyze CSS when retrieving via JS.
    - IshKebab 11y ago
      Or they could just see if it contains links to the app/play store.
  - tripzilch 11y ago
    Which is weird because most of the reasons they give are valid for any type of interstitial, there's not a lot of reasons that set app interstitials apart from others that are relevant to the user. They're basically a new kind of pop-up window, an annoyance that you have to click away. I don't remember browsers only blocking certain kinds of pop-ups based on content, they just see if it wasn't initiated by a user-action, it'll get blocked. I suppose for Google there may be some reasons why they want to block the app-interstitials (I guess because they want to encourage keeping the content they index on the web, not in an app?), but even then, that's still no reason not to punish the other types of interstitial just as much. Trying to make the distinction is just making it harder on themselves, they will occasionally get it wrong, or people will complain that their interstitial shouldn't be punished because it is (somehow) not quite about the app--making the criteria a bit broader seems like it's easier for Google and better for the users?
gjolund 11y ago
I'd really like to see a universal app / site rating service that judges apps / sites on their stability, privacy, security, legitimacy of requested permission, and general UX. It could then provide alternatives to the app / site, and possibly even an anonymous whistleblower service for employees .
- guptaneil 11y ago
  This. A Yelp for websites that encourages sites to be good web citizens.
  - n0us 11y ago
    I would like to see a vote based search engine with modified reddit-style searching where a single vote's relevance is a function of its age and the number of existing votes. (but without the post life cycle of reddit where posts drop because of age)
    - greglindahl 11y ago
      Like many interesting ideas in search, this one's been tried several times. Blekko and Bing both used Facebook friends' likes for votes, but coverage was low. Google toyed with up/down votes for a short while after Wikia Search launched, but I suspect the overwhelming majority of votes were malicious. On the other hand, using result long-clicks as votes is quite popular, and seems to work well.
madsushi 11y ago
Seems a bit hypocritical, considering they were using app install interstitial pages as recently as July: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-case-study-on-app-download-interstitials.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-...
- Mahn 11y ago
  > Based on these results, we decided to permanently retire the interstitial. Well at least they admitted they are bad, even if they tried them.
- OJFord 11y ago
  Not really, seeing as the article you link addresses that? It's like a car company saying "we used to only make black cars, but actually we looked into it, and now we think people want colours; so we're making them".
  - madsushi 11y ago
    Continued: "So we're making them, and we're penalizing any dealerships that are still selling black cars."
    - Someone1234 11y ago
      Unfortunately your continued use of that analogy has backfired. If a car manufacturer used to sell black cars, then added other colors, if their own dealers refused to sell the additional colors, it would be entirely reasonable for the manufacturer to step in (since it hurts the manufacturer's brand). So in that analogy, the manufacturer is right. The reality is that Google aren't a car manufacturer, they're more like a car magazine. Suddenly they decide not to feature trucks, and therefore Bobs BigTruckin modal X2000 coming out next month is penalised because they won't be featured in the next issue. Is it "fair?" In general, yes, but in this specific case because Google holds a monopoly on the market you could argue it is unfair. A lot of sites will suddenly see a large drop-off of traffic if they didn't get the memo, because so many depend on Google for redirects.
davidw 11y ago
When are they going to shit-can sites that have tiny 'next' buttons next to big Google ads with arrows in them? The ones like "20 pictures of celebrities' hairy moles!".
kevando 11y ago
Google will soon start encouraging you to continue using their apps. FTFY
lunz 11y ago
Hopefully Google can distinguish them from the "By browsing this site, you accept the use of Cookies [X]"-popups that EU websites have to implement now.
- jacquesm 11y ago
  Hopefully they can't. Maybe that way we can finally get rid of those pop-ups because there will be a very large amount of noise.
- bouke 11y ago
  Site owners should be punished for those banners, as they could refrain from using third party tracking cookies instead.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
    - magicalist 11y ago
      google analytics uses first party cookies.
- greglindahl 11y ago
  The EU law doesn't specify the mechanism used to inform the user. If you look around at different websites, several mechanisms are used, some more obnoxious than others. Popups are the worst user experience of the lot.
- ascagnel_ 11y ago
  Unlikely -- those links usually don't contain links to your platform's respective app store.
jacquesm 11y ago
Does that mean they'll block youtube? Try playing a video on a phone that does not have the youtube app installed, it's just about impossible to get it right, it's a roulette that's rigged with more than half the links going to the youtube app page on google play. Highly annoying since there is no reason why the youtube page of some video should even have that app installation link at all.
- huskyr 11y ago
  Same thing for Google Calendar. You'll have to hunt for the tiny 'I'm one of those people that is perfectly happy with the website, please skip this crap' link somewhere in a tiny font in a hidden corner of the interstitial.
- xiaoma 11y ago
  I sure hope so. Google has been a pretty bad offender across the board as far as pushing users to install their mobile apps: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893/photo/1 https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893/photo/1 Even more extreme is that every single time I click a link in a hangouts chat on iOS, it asks me if I want to download Chrome.
- nevir 11y ago
  Yes, most likely they will downrank youtube until the youtube team fixes it
  - kuschku 11y ago
    And still embed YouTube results in the search... The EU investigation committee is going to love this.
    - lern_too_spel 11y ago
      I also see non-YouTube videos embedded in search. I believe they'll embed videos from any site so long as they're marked up properly or in a video sitemap.
- 11y ago
saidajigumi 11y ago
Ugh, maybe this will finally push forums to burn those infernal Tapatalk interstitials. Forum owners: I'm looking for one piece of information from a web search, not a whole dumb app that will completely ignore my search goals.
- reilly3000 11y ago
  I've never actually taken the bait. What is the app like?
  - jbigelow76 11y ago
    I must be in the minority but the Tapatalk app seems okay to me. It takes the cruft and ads out of the forum you are on and just presents you the content in a relatively stripped down format. Maybe my use case is out of the ordinary compared to a lot of HN, I use it for a single forum that I am an active member of, and I can't recall the last time I googled something and was redirected to a result that was a forum entry that redirected to a Tapatalk ad (99% of my google searches end up at stackoverflow or blog entries).
    - michaelmrose 11y ago
      I think people aren't complaining about the quality of the app. Rather we dislike the fact that when clicking a link to a forum we are forced to decline to install their app before we can view what we are looking for. Personally I close the page. I really hope the creators of tapatalk go out of business.
      - reilly3000 11y ago
        If Google, phpBB and tapatalk and get their shit together they would support deeplinking and make the experience seemless. It's not even that technically challenging but could run afoul of existing ad models...
- Vexs 11y ago
  God I hate tapatalk with a passion. It's even worse when it redirects you to the front of a forum instead of the thread you were trying to get to.
danielrakh 11y ago
I can't help but think this is a jab at Apple for allowing ad blockers in iOS 9.
- tajen 11y ago
  For once the consumer experience wins on the two fronts. Or maybe the UX used to suck on the two because of a secret non-agression pact between Google and Apple ;)
avemg 11y ago
In and of itself I really like this move, but I have to wonder if it's good thing in the long run to allow Google to assert its vision of good UX on the entire web. Where's the line? Of course nobody is forcing websites to do anything, but Google is such an important traffic driver it's hard to imagine a site not having to comply to survive.
- leereeves 11y ago
  What's the alternative to allowing Google to rank results as it chooses?
  - EarthLaunch 11y ago
    Government forcing them to modify that based on 'fairness', 'need', etc. It's coming and it will be supported by HN, for obvious reasons.
  - profinger 11y ago
    Be really mad and use AskJeeves. lmao
wcummings 11y ago
>Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites That Use Competing Ad Platforms
- n0us 11y ago
  Not sure why you're getting downvoted. I have wondered this myself. Between punishing sites that are not mobile responsive and this move I wonder if their motivations are partly fueled by the fear that mobile users are spending more times within native apps and not enough time on the web. As you can read here their response to the EU antitrust lawsuit http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/14/internal-google-memo-responds-to-eu-antitrust-objections/#.m5yn4p:FTKu http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/14/internal-google-memo-respon... google makes the argument that users spend a lot of time inside apps. I would expect they are worried about the ability for users to go directly to content and bypass search from which they make money. I'm not sure which side of the fence I fall on. The web is arguably a more open technology than native apps but the experience in a native app is often better.
  - matchu 11y ago
    I think you're right that Google are worried about users moving to a market where they're not relevant. That's why Google have made a point of becoming relevant: they have a mobile OS, a mobile app market, and a mobile app ad platform. If people move away from web and toward Google's mobile properties, then they're probably pretty okay with that.
    - n0us 11y ago
      If they move toward Google's mobile properties I would expect they're okay with that. I think Google loses a degree of control over the user once they enter the app even if they are able to advertise. They can't require app makers to put ads into critical locations in the app but they can certainly do that in their search results. Google also doesn't have quite the monopoly over the app market that they do over search.
      - 11y ago
serge2k 11y ago
You know, at some point (and we are around that point) Google does cross a line where they are abusing their near monopoly on search. This is a pro consumer move, but it's another instance of Google saying do things our way or we punish you.
- prawn 11y ago
  And where does it end? With them dictating design? Demote sites they think are ugly? Or that don't validate? Why only this type of interstitial and not those pushing newsletters or paywalls or surveys? "I know you've only just arrived and read all of one sentence but CHECK OUT OUR NEWSLETTER!"
- jmscharff2 11y ago
  But when that happens you can always use....Bing :)
- avar 11y ago
  It's not at all unreasonable that if sites want to be indexed for their content that a search engine penalizes them if they don't display that content prominently once the user lands on the site and instead display some advert orthogonal to what the user wanted.
- matchu 11y ago
  I'm not sure what makes this abuse. Curating the content you serve isn't just okay; it's one of the key value propositions of a search engine. The problem is when a content provider, for whatever reason, intentionally curates in a way that provides less value to the consumer.
  - jbigelow76 11y ago
    So what about an OS vendor that "curates" a particular default browser and destroys a competing browser provider in the process? I seem to remember that happening a few years back. It's not so much the curating that's the problem, nobody would care if Duck Duck Go did it, the problem is with the regulators that view Google to be the only curator out there.
thrownaway2424 11y ago
What ad network is it that serves up ads that actually open up the iOS App Store, without having tapped on anything? That's super annoying.
- cm2187 11y ago
  My personal solution is to install the app, give it a very bad rating with the reason why I am pissed off as a comment and delete the app.
  - dizzyviolet 11y ago
    Ohhh. I like that idea. I'm going to start doing that.
    - ianlevesque 11y ago
      Your installs are improving their App Store ranking anyway though!
      - cryptoz 11y ago
        Are they? I don't think so. And especially not if the all is uninstalled within minutes. Apple puts much more weight into the ranking than into 'total downloads' (which would be the only increasing metric in this case.
      - bduerst 11y ago
        Not if you uninstall right away.
- lucidstack 11y ago
  Ultimate Guitar, I'm looking at you. The worst.
  - skeletonjelly 11y ago
    Their push to install the app is horrendous. It just keeps getting worse too!
neoCrimeLabs 11y ago
This is a little curmudgeonly, but this is how I feel... If your developers are not capable of making your website mobible friendly in 2015, any app they develop is likely worse. This is especially true when your app demands access to everything on my phone even though it doesn't need any of it to function.
- roasm 11y ago
  You're suggesting that you can make something as usable on a mobile browser as you can with a native app. That's just not true; if it were, there wouldn't be any native apps. For many use cases (games, highly interactive experiences, camera or microphone using app, etc.), a native app may just be better, and guiding users there might be a better experience and a better conversion funnel. Yes, you can make a website mobile friendly, but that doesn't mean it will be as good as the native app.
  - stcredzero 11y ago
    Often, the native app is just as bad or worse! At least the just-as-bad native app didn't soak up your time and bandwidth!
    - ianstallings 11y ago
      If that were the case no one would ever install native apps. But the reality is given the choice, most people will use the app. I know this is a fact because mobile is my bread and butter. But if you need some evidence just go look at any of the analytics data that's out there. The majority of time spent on mobile by a user is using an app, with a much smaller percentage of time using the browser.
      - stcredzero 11y ago
        Most apps are ok, or at least no worse than the browser. Some are way worse. In no case does the interstitial take into account your momentary cost/benefit for downloading/installing or if the app is any good.
squiggy22 11y ago
Ha. Yet their advertising optimisation teams continue to tout the benefits of implementing an interstitial ad unit on mobile: https://developers.google.com/mobile-ads-sdk/docs/dfp/android/interstitial https://developers.google.com/mobile-ads-sdk/docs/dfp/androi... Edit. More here: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/mobile-ads-interstitial.html https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/mobile-ads-intersti... Left hand doesn't know what right hand is doing.
- blowski 11y ago
  As I understood the article, they're not discouraging all full page interstitial ads, just the ones which tout the mobile app of the website itself on first screen load.
- blazespin 11y ago
  As techchrunch pointed out, Google doesn't monetize iOS apps very well. Left and right hands are very much in sync.
- oaktowner 11y ago
  Those links appear to be about ads within apps, not on web pages. They can often be annoying, but that's different than interstitials on top of a mobile web site, right?
  - manigandham 11y ago
    Yes, in-app is a very different environment from mobile web. Also they only want to stop full page ads pushing to download the app, not any other full page ad.
jbigelow76 11y ago
The most annoying aspect of app install interstitials is when the publisher doesn't offer a version of their app for your platform, which for us Windows Phone users is pretty much all of them. One more indignity I guess :)
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
smegel 11y ago
Which seems to be like 90% of them. Good guy Google for once.
- unfunco 11y ago
  Is it? It might seem like it's good guy Google, but Google is a company with shareholders and their mission objective (despite what they claim) is to maximise profit for their shareholders. They're the most powerful advertising agency in the world and they're punishing smaller advertising models. Don't get me wrong, I dislike advertising; I'd rather pay for content, but this strikes me as anti-competitive.
mark_l_watson 11y ago
Fantastic - so glad to see this. I use a browser to use facebook and twitter on my android phone. No I don't want to install an app, thanks! Still, G's new policy allows small install the app links, which is fine because a lot of people do want the app versions of web properties.
Fomite 11y ago
I expect them to get rid of the "You know you can install the App!" ads on Gmail for iOS first.
amelius 11y ago
You can say what you want about this benefiting the end user, but Google is acting as a market regulator now.
evboyle 11y ago
cough * cough * linkedin
mischanix 11y ago
These kinds of ads are the reason I leave javascript disabled on my phone. It prevents all kinds of annoyances and saves a significant amount of battery as well.
- exodust 11y ago
  Yes but that's annoying when you want JS enabled to view something like a slideshow on a web page. Swiping from one image to the other requires JS, and you need to go into settings and turn it on. Then remember to turn it off again. And you might not even know there's a gallery to view, because without JS the fallback might be a single image rather than a prompt to swipe the slideshow. When the simple act of swiping within a web page requires JS, you're crippling your own experience. Not to mention all the other JS-powered functions on a page. Adding things to a shopping cart etc, is much more user friendly with JS enabled.
prodmerc 11y ago
Does that mean the death of Tapatalk? 'cause I'm all in. Stop pestering me to install your stupid app, I like my browser just fine...
dtournemille 11y ago
Is it Google's "job" to police websites in this fashion?
- MichaelGG 11y ago
  Ffs yes. Google's entire point of existence is to rank sites. Literally that's the only function of a search engine.
- exodust 11y ago
  Google isn't banning websites, only denying them "mobile friendly" status, which naturally downranks them. Fair enough too. When you click a search result link, you want the information, not a full screen ad that's hard to close.
marak830 11y ago
I wonder if this has anything todo with apples push to block adverts to get people to make an app(and thus advertise that app on their site). Maybe i'm looking too much into this ;)
sharkweek 11y ago
As a user, I'm pro-getting rid of interstitial ads on mobile. But just for dissenting opinion, this definitely feels monopolistic. "Stay on the native web so we can sell more ads!" Maybe it's mutually beneficial for Google and its search users, but this is certainly the argument that's going to come from folks who are about to lose a ton of app downloads. http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-protecting-consumers-search-monopoly-228543 http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-pro...
- matchu 11y ago
  If anyone tries to make that argument, the counter will be simple: "We want developers to make native apps! That's why we're making App Indexing a thing." There's definitely some advantage to keeping people on the web, since App Indexing requires buy-in from content producers, but, if browsers start truly losing to native apps, Google are prepared. https://developers.google.com/app-indexing/ https://developers.google.com/app-indexing/
look_lookatme 11y ago
maybe they should punish their fucking AdX buyers that redirect people to the app stores for a change note: i work for a publisher and when an app store redirect comes through AdX or AppNexus and someone makes a complaint it is one of the worst, most helpless feelings. this is why people use adblock and there is nothing we can do because the networks are, still, an important part of our entire revenue stream
ksec 11y ago
May be only me, I dont really find those annoying, in fact i find them helpful when they tell me my favorite site has an App and I dont need to use Mobile Browser to Read.
- exodust 11y ago
  There are better ways to tell you about the app that don't annoy 99% of people.
werber 11y ago
Is this an announcement for the death of the unknown app, or Google give a big hug to using the browser more?
vacri 11y ago
I misread the title and was hoping that those .gif ads with misleading 'download', 'next', or 'inbox mail' buttons would be penalised. Ah, well...
ChuckMcM 11y ago
I wonder if this is more search defense than it is user experience work. One of the things web driven access gives you is access to the search traffic through that web site, once you go to the App all that traffic goes with it. Its clear that an app for everything is getting pushed hard by content providers.
jane_is_here 11y ago
How much longer before Google starts flagging Sourceforge as a malware site ?
- JohnTHaller 11y ago
  SourceForge distributes bundleware offer installers for only a handful of projects (I think 12) that have opted into their Dev Share program. Interesting Fact: A chunk of Google Chrome's install growth has been courtesy of the exact same type of bundleware offers with Adobe Flash, Java updates, and free antivirus installs/updates.
amolgupta 11y ago
what about the companies who dont have a mobile web version? All they have is a page to install app when opened on mobile? Do they show the desktop version or kill that page? eg. Flipkart and Myntra
- hobarrera 11y ago
  Those don't qualify as "mobile app ads" really. Those are actual websites that merely link to a mobile app.
FilterSweep 11y ago
So they're still not punishing sites that force redirect your mobile browser to a failed app download page I see. I shouldn't have to worry about my browser unintentionally trying to download the Draftkings app from a sports blog I'm reading.
manigandham 11y ago
Best to read this twitter thread: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893 https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893 This only applies to page covering ads for app installs. Not other interstitials. In fact Google recently did a study showing how 69% of people leave the page when faced with an interstitial [1], yet they also recently released an updated format for their own Google overlay ad [2] (although this is for apps). They don't want to lose web/search traffic to apps, but they make plenty of money running these formats themselves. A good summary of the various conflicts of interest is here [3]. 1. http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/07/google-case-study-on-app-download-interstitials.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/07/google-ca... 2. http://adwords.blogspot.com/2015/08/beautiful-new-designs-for-full-screen.html http://adwords.blogspot.com/2015/08/beautiful-new-designs-fo... 3. http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-protecting-consumers-search-monopoly-228543 http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-pro...
- YokoZar 11y ago
  Sorry, but what? What does an ad that shows between levels of angry birds on your phone have to do with ads blocking you from getting your search result? This sounds like some weird sort of misdirection attempt.
  - manigandham 11y ago
    Edited for clarity: Google is claiming to do this to improve user experience, however: - they do these exact ads on every site they have - they arent stopping other interstitials so sites can be just as annoying on the first page - a site with great content should not be penalized for the site's own choices on ads - they're forcing a change that affects everyone else except them The PR signal doesnt match the execution. It's a monopolistic move and raises questions about their involvement in so many layers of the ads/web stack.
    - magicalist 11y ago
      The only thing you just said that made sense was: > the signal is that they don't want their search results to annoy users by showing them app install ads on the first hit which is absolutely great. Well done Google. Everything else in your post is weird and contradictory. They're apparently fine with advertising and non-annoying app install banners but they're going to make annoying app install banners less visible in search results. I'm really not seeing the problem. > It might be good for the consumer but that's just a side effect. See what I mean? So it's a great move and should be celebrated, but lets not congratulate Google on their motives? OK, I think we can all live with that.
illivah 11y ago
Dance websites! dance!
andoma 11y ago
First i thought the title read "Google Will Soon Start Pushing Mobile Sites That Use Annoying App Install Ads" :)
collyw 11y ago
Google is as bad as anyone when I open up stuff in my Ubuntu phone.
iamadatawhore 11y ago
bout time.
yoz-y 11y ago
Hm, I've rarely seen such pushes for app installs. I've mostly seen banner-like ads. However, I hope they will also start penalising websites that use overlays for mailing list submissions and account creation - before even giving you chance to read the article you came in for.
thespace123 11y ago
don't be evil
bibabo 11y ago
(I don't like these ads) 1. Apps can't be searched or content linked from Google.com 2. Apps don't show (as much?) Google ads 1 + 2 = Google penalty

683 points by zhuxuefeng1994 11y ago

zaczac 11y ago

google is the biggest ads app. how funny

cm2187 11y ago

I can't resist mentioning that one of the greatest offenders is news.google.com

teaneedz 11y ago

Can't wait to see the Yahoo! interstitial news app go away or at least stop hijacking the whole screen.

titfn 11y ago

How many years did it take for Google to react to this?

mada299 11y ago

I think it's interesting that they are making this decision - one that clearly pushed users to stay on the mobile web which is beneficial for Google - based on a study that was pretty flawed. This article debunks their methodology pretty well: https://medium.com/@alexaustin/just-because-it-s-google-doesn-t-mean-it-s-right-5fe27b912f28 https://medium.com/@alexaustin/just-because-it-s-google-does...

Filligree 11y ago
Hush, don't tell them--they might decide not to do it.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- mada299 11y ago
  I built an app without having a website before so I get the perspective of the app developer here too - trying to get people to their app. But I agree that interstitials is not the answer. We ended up building mobile app content previews (deepviews) for all the apps using our deeplinks (I work for Branch.io) which work much better.
EricBurnett 11y ago
Thanks for the link, that's a nice critique. That said, much of their arguments don't apply here. The article take the publisher's ("businesses") perspective, but that's not consistent with a search engine in this case - the original study is more accurate from the perspective of optimizing for the search user. The business wants to convert low-value mobile users into high-value app installers, and would happily sacrifice most to get a few installs if that's net positive on long-term value. The search engine, on the other hand, wants as many users as possible to be successful in finding what they're looking for. These perspectives are not aligned - high abandonment rates due to interstitials can be fine for the business, yet penalized as destinations from a search engine. The underlying question is who Google optimizes for in this case, the user or the destination.
- mada299 11y ago
  Hi Eric, good points. But what about the case in which what a user is looking for is actually inside the app? More of mobile traffic is moving into apps - shouldn't we find ways to also index and show content as well?
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

rubyn00bie 11y ago

tldr; Cool... but shouldn't google stop policing the internet and abusing, what some might call, monopoly powers for trivial gains. ====== I'd be willing to bet, this will one day be in an FTC/DOJ report about monopoly practices at Google... Google seems to have forgotten they don't want to be looked at as a monopoly or abusing their power for the small things. While this is consumer friendly, at least at first glance, I still find it anti-competitive and generally worthless exertion of their near monopoly power. It also effects them quite heavily (GMail being my prime example). If I had to guess, this is a decision by someone who is lacking the resources to fully grasp the decision and potential long term ramifications of their action. Maybe they do, but for a company of their size this seems petty. The potential anti-trust lawsuit however will not be petty.

markdown 11y ago
This is like a television service provider pledging to give their customers (who want high quality tv shows) more high quality tv shows and less shitty shows.
TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
This isn't an anti-trust issue. Google's not using its market dominance to move into a new market. It's more like a common practice by retailers: using their market share to force changes by their suppliers. For example, Tesco (the largest UK supermarket) recently banned certain sugary drinks targeted at children.
- kuschku 11y ago
  But Google is, even today still using these same interstitial ads for Gmail. That means it will most likely end up in some antitrust trial.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    Or Google will stop doing it before it starts applying the penalty. Or Google Search will penalize other Google sites that use those ads. It wouldn't be the first time Google-owned sites have run afoul of Google Search penalties.

bradgessler 11y ago

Content publishers have created a really bad situation for themselves on the web from these types of ads, slow Javascripts, and other "ad tech" excesses. Apple is responding with ad blocking technology and a news app. Facebook has responded with articles that load quickly from their apps. These solutions represent an existential threat to the open web, and therefore Google. I really hope Google doesn't just stop at app ads, and starts punishing websites that do objectively horrible things to end-user experience.

dssddsds 11y ago

Isn't this a tiny bit concerning that one company can effectively force the web to comply with their standards by "punishing" any non-conformers? I know Bing exists, but still, this is something that would happen in a monopoly.

exodust 11y ago
When 100% of people find those intrusive pop-ups annoying, the "standard" then is not so much belonging to Google, but shared by all.

antr 11y ago

Finally, I hope those sites don't even make it to the first serp.

thebokehwokeh2 11y ago

They're looking at you http://www.ultimate-guitar.com http://www.ultimate-guitar.com

benbristow 11y ago
That website looks so dated nowadays. Really needs a revamp.
- oaktowner 11y ago
  Probably because they've been putting all of their resources into the app which they advertise so annoyingly.
  - rhizome 11y ago
    Also probably because like Spotify, they are paying every penny they get for royalties.
Mahn 11y ago
As a beginner guitarist, this is site is the worst. It's a shame that honest sites like olga.net don't exist anymore.
- jnevill 11y ago
  Oh man I miss olga. I had completely forgotten about it. These "newer" sites are the pits and every single one of them does this BS app install crap. Thank goodness for the "View as desktop" button in mobile browsers.
  - tajen 11y ago
    Do we have an idea about their business model? How much do they pay the music labels for the right to display half-quality tabs? I've always assumed the labels asking for money were the reason why there was so much advertising on those sites and why no plain-text site ever survived.

alexbilbie 11y ago

I hope they also stop serving adverts that redirect from Safari to the App Store too

wlesieutre 11y ago
I thought Safari doesn't even allow this anymore because of all the popup forwarder spam?
- alexbilbie 11y ago
  I still experience it every so often (iOS 8.4.1). The last time it happened it was on Techcrunch
  - wlesieutre 11y ago
    I see. Looks like they were at least to be blocked, but the system either wasn't shipped or doesn't work reliably. http://sentrant.com/2015/03/12/safari-to-app-store-redirect-from-ad-on-ios-8-2/ http://sentrant.com/2015/03/12/safari-to-app-store-redirect-...
- twoodfin 11y ago
  UIWebView is definitely still vulnerable, as I've seen it when browsing sites through the default Twitter iOS client. Not as frequently as in the past, however.
jakejake 11y ago
Facebook links used to be so bad with this until they changed something in the built-in browser to catch them. Now every time I get a "this page is trying to leave the app" confirmation box I feel extremely satisfied that the redirect was squashed.

nilved 11y ago

What about sites that prompt you to enable push notifications?

jasonlotito 11y ago
That is a feature of the browser, and is on the browser to make it not annoying. While it's fair to say you might find it annoying and might not want to see it, others do find it valuable. If a browser feature is annoying you, the correct approach would be to disable that feature in the browser. If the browser doesn't allow you to do this, than it's the browser's implementation that is at fault. This all assumes the site is using the features the browser makers are telling the sites to use.
- pdkl95 11y ago
  The correct answer is that features like push notifications should be opt-in in the browser. Too many of these features exploit the general ignorance of users. > If a browser feature is annoying you, the correct approach would be to disable that feature in the browser. Yet when some of us shut off Javascript - a feature that is often annoying, enables many kinds of tracking, and occasionally creates serious security problems - half of HN freaks out. Given that Javascript is necessary for many types of surveillance-as-a-business-model, hostility to the idea of disabling javascript is expected. Push notifications are still a newer feature, but once that feature becomes entrenched enough that some people's profit depends on the feature, disabling push notifications in the client will be regarded with similar hostility.
  - jasonlotito 11y ago
    > The correct answer is that features like push notifications should be opt-in in the browser. They are. They are completely opt-in. You don't get push notifications unless you ask for them.

Aldo_MX 11y ago

And when will they punish advertisements that redirect to app stores? or even worse, websites that activate WAP subscriptions...

tbranyen 11y ago

I read this as publishing and was getting mad, then I read the article and smiled. Thanks Google! I absolutely hate sites that do this.

ianphughes 11y ago

I still do not understand the popularity of this approach. It seems to crazy increase bounce rates. You would think that negative user behavior would already make these undesirable without Google being explicit?

rasz_pl 11y ago
Works the same as nigerian prince stories - it filters out smart people and leaves you with suckers.
s3r3nity 11y ago
As someone working in tech, and does digital marketing consulting, there is actually a lot of value in these interstitials: 1) Usually the app is infinitely better than the mobile web experience. You can chalk it up to prioritization of engineering working on iOS / Android app development over a mobile web experience -- usually for good reason. 2) It's a solid retention strategy. You can harp on about bounce rates reducing activation rates (bounce rates aren't as high as you might think btw in certain cases) but at the end of the day, a 1% increase in repeat purchase rate (or insert other retention metric here) will have a much much more significant impact than a 1% increase in activation. It only works for certain scenarios and cases, but at the end of the day, there's significant data to show that they work.
- roasm 11y ago
  I generally agree with these points. We ended up with an interstitial the same way I hope most everyone else did: we A/B tested it, and the results were clearly positive on engagement and purchase. We could choose to drop the interstitial as a matter of principal or on the assumption that the difficult-to-quantify long-term benefit will pay off later, but we'd have to make that decision not in the absence of data, but actually in opposition to the data. Or let Google make the decision for us...
- ianphughes 11y ago
  I am not sure I agree with your first point. It seems the most frequent case is that a user wants to access content right away. Regardless of how much "better" the native experience might be, its a lot of hoops to jump through to fulfill the immediate need. I certainly can't argue that it does yield positive business results under certain scenarios, but for the average user it seems to injure common web experiences.

justincormack 11y ago

Does this apply to "please subscribe to our stupid newsletter" that obscures many sites now?

sgustard 11y ago
Per http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/09/mobile-friendly-web-pages-using-app.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/09/mobile-fr... "After November 1, mobile web pages that show an app install interstitial that hides a significant amount of content on the transition from the search result page will no longer be considered mobile-friendly. This does not affect other types of interstitials." This implies the answer is No, since that's another type of interstitial (not an app install) -- but is one that blocks most of the page content. It's curious that they're analyzing the nature of the popup closely enough to determine that.
- jfoster 11y ago
  Perhaps they're approximating by analyzing the page as a mobile user agent and a non-mobile user agent, then comparing.
  - rhizome 11y ago
    They know what the content is, so they can probably analyze CSS when retrieving via JS.
  - IshKebab 11y ago
    Or they could just see if it contains links to the app/play store.
- tripzilch 11y ago
  Which is weird because most of the reasons they give are valid for any type of interstitial, there's not a lot of reasons that set app interstitials apart from others that are relevant to the user. They're basically a new kind of pop-up window, an annoyance that you have to click away. I don't remember browsers only blocking certain kinds of pop-ups based on content, they just see if it wasn't initiated by a user-action, it'll get blocked. I suppose for Google there may be some reasons why they want to block the app-interstitials (I guess because they want to encourage keeping the content they index on the web, not in an app?), but even then, that's still no reason not to punish the other types of interstitial just as much. Trying to make the distinction is just making it harder on themselves, they will occasionally get it wrong, or people will complain that their interstitial shouldn't be punished because it is (somehow) not quite about the app--making the criteria a bit broader seems like it's easier for Google and better for the users?

gjolund 11y ago

I'd really like to see a universal app / site rating service that judges apps / sites on their stability, privacy, security, legitimacy of requested permission, and general UX. It could then provide alternatives to the app / site, and possibly even an anonymous whistleblower service for employees .

guptaneil 11y ago
This. A Yelp for websites that encourages sites to be good web citizens.
- n0us 11y ago
  I would like to see a vote based search engine with modified reddit-style searching where a single vote's relevance is a function of its age and the number of existing votes. (but without the post life cycle of reddit where posts drop because of age)
  - greglindahl 11y ago
    Like many interesting ideas in search, this one's been tried several times. Blekko and Bing both used Facebook friends' likes for votes, but coverage was low. Google toyed with up/down votes for a short while after Wikia Search launched, but I suspect the overwhelming majority of votes were malicious. On the other hand, using result long-clicks as votes is quite popular, and seems to work well.

madsushi 11y ago

Seems a bit hypocritical, considering they were using app install interstitial pages as recently as July: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-case-study-on-app-download-interstitials.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-...

Mahn 11y ago
> Based on these results, we decided to permanently retire the interstitial. Well at least they admitted they are bad, even if they tried them.
OJFord 11y ago
Not really, seeing as the article you link addresses that? It's like a car company saying "we used to only make black cars, but actually we looked into it, and now we think people want colours; so we're making them".
- madsushi 11y ago
  Continued: "So we're making them, and we're penalizing any dealerships that are still selling black cars."
  - Someone1234 11y ago
    Unfortunately your continued use of that analogy has backfired. If a car manufacturer used to sell black cars, then added other colors, if their own dealers refused to sell the additional colors, it would be entirely reasonable for the manufacturer to step in (since it hurts the manufacturer's brand). So in that analogy, the manufacturer is right. The reality is that Google aren't a car manufacturer, they're more like a car magazine. Suddenly they decide not to feature trucks, and therefore Bobs BigTruckin modal X2000 coming out next month is penalised because they won't be featured in the next issue. Is it "fair?" In general, yes, but in this specific case because Google holds a monopoly on the market you could argue it is unfair. A lot of sites will suddenly see a large drop-off of traffic if they didn't get the memo, because so many depend on Google for redirects.

davidw 11y ago

When are they going to shit-can sites that have tiny 'next' buttons next to big Google ads with arrows in them? The ones like "20 pictures of celebrities' hairy moles!".

kevando 11y ago

Google will soon start encouraging you to continue using their apps. FTFY

lunz 11y ago

Hopefully Google can distinguish them from the "By browsing this site, you accept the use of Cookies [X]"-popups that EU websites have to implement now.

jacquesm 11y ago
Hopefully they can't. Maybe that way we can finally get rid of those pop-ups because there will be a very large amount of noise.
bouke 11y ago
Site owners should be punished for those banners, as they could refrain from using third party tracking cookies instead.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
  - magicalist 11y ago
    google analytics uses first party cookies.
greglindahl 11y ago
The EU law doesn't specify the mechanism used to inform the user. If you look around at different websites, several mechanisms are used, some more obnoxious than others. Popups are the worst user experience of the lot.
ascagnel_ 11y ago
Unlikely -- those links usually don't contain links to your platform's respective app store.

jacquesm 11y ago

Does that mean they'll block youtube? Try playing a video on a phone that does not have the youtube app installed, it's just about impossible to get it right, it's a roulette that's rigged with more than half the links going to the youtube app page on google play. Highly annoying since there is no reason why the youtube page of some video should even have that app installation link at all.

huskyr 11y ago
Same thing for Google Calendar. You'll have to hunt for the tiny 'I'm one of those people that is perfectly happy with the website, please skip this crap' link somewhere in a tiny font in a hidden corner of the interstitial.
xiaoma 11y ago
I sure hope so. Google has been a pretty bad offender across the board as far as pushing users to install their mobile apps: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893/photo/1 https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893/photo/1 Even more extreme is that every single time I click a link in a hangouts chat on iOS, it asks me if I want to download Chrome.
nevir 11y ago
Yes, most likely they will downrank youtube until the youtube team fixes it
- kuschku 11y ago
  And still embed YouTube results in the search... The EU investigation committee is going to love this.
  - lern_too_spel 11y ago
    I also see non-YouTube videos embedded in search. I believe they'll embed videos from any site so long as they're marked up properly or in a video sitemap.
11y ago

saidajigumi 11y ago

Ugh, maybe this will finally push forums to burn those infernal Tapatalk interstitials. Forum owners: I'm looking for one piece of information from a web search, not a whole dumb app that will completely ignore my search goals.

reilly3000 11y ago
I've never actually taken the bait. What is the app like?
- jbigelow76 11y ago
  I must be in the minority but the Tapatalk app seems okay to me. It takes the cruft and ads out of the forum you are on and just presents you the content in a relatively stripped down format. Maybe my use case is out of the ordinary compared to a lot of HN, I use it for a single forum that I am an active member of, and I can't recall the last time I googled something and was redirected to a result that was a forum entry that redirected to a Tapatalk ad (99% of my google searches end up at stackoverflow or blog entries).
  - michaelmrose 11y ago
    I think people aren't complaining about the quality of the app. Rather we dislike the fact that when clicking a link to a forum we are forced to decline to install their app before we can view what we are looking for. Personally I close the page. I really hope the creators of tapatalk go out of business.
    - reilly3000 11y ago
      If Google, phpBB and tapatalk and get their shit together they would support deeplinking and make the experience seemless. It's not even that technically challenging but could run afoul of existing ad models...
Vexs 11y ago
God I hate tapatalk with a passion. It's even worse when it redirects you to the front of a forum instead of the thread you were trying to get to.

danielrakh 11y ago

I can't help but think this is a jab at Apple for allowing ad blockers in iOS 9.

tajen 11y ago
For once the consumer experience wins on the two fronts. Or maybe the UX used to suck on the two because of a secret non-agression pact between Google and Apple ;)

avemg 11y ago

In and of itself I really like this move, but I have to wonder if it's good thing in the long run to allow Google to assert its vision of good UX on the entire web. Where's the line? Of course nobody is forcing websites to do anything, but Google is such an important traffic driver it's hard to imagine a site not having to comply to survive.

leereeves 11y ago
What's the alternative to allowing Google to rank results as it chooses?
- EarthLaunch 11y ago
  Government forcing them to modify that based on 'fairness', 'need', etc. It's coming and it will be supported by HN, for obvious reasons.
- profinger 11y ago
  Be really mad and use AskJeeves. lmao

wcummings 11y ago

>Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites That Use Competing Ad Platforms

n0us 11y ago
Not sure why you're getting downvoted. I have wondered this myself. Between punishing sites that are not mobile responsive and this move I wonder if their motivations are partly fueled by the fear that mobile users are spending more times within native apps and not enough time on the web. As you can read here their response to the EU antitrust lawsuit http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/14/internal-google-memo-responds-to-eu-antitrust-objections/#.m5yn4p:FTKu http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/14/internal-google-memo-respon... google makes the argument that users spend a lot of time inside apps. I would expect they are worried about the ability for users to go directly to content and bypass search from which they make money. I'm not sure which side of the fence I fall on. The web is arguably a more open technology than native apps but the experience in a native app is often better.
- matchu 11y ago
  I think you're right that Google are worried about users moving to a market where they're not relevant. That's why Google have made a point of becoming relevant: they have a mobile OS, a mobile app market, and a mobile app ad platform. If people move away from web and toward Google's mobile properties, then they're probably pretty okay with that.
  - n0us 11y ago
    If they move toward Google's mobile properties I would expect they're okay with that. I think Google loses a degree of control over the user once they enter the app even if they are able to advertise. They can't require app makers to put ads into critical locations in the app but they can certainly do that in their search results. Google also doesn't have quite the monopoly over the app market that they do over search.
    - 11y ago

serge2k 11y ago

You know, at some point (and we are around that point) Google does cross a line where they are abusing their near monopoly on search. This is a pro consumer move, but it's another instance of Google saying do things our way or we punish you.

prawn 11y ago
And where does it end? With them dictating design? Demote sites they think are ugly? Or that don't validate? Why only this type of interstitial and not those pushing newsletters or paywalls or surveys? "I know you've only just arrived and read all of one sentence but CHECK OUT OUR NEWSLETTER!"
jmscharff2 11y ago
But when that happens you can always use....Bing :)
avar 11y ago
It's not at all unreasonable that if sites want to be indexed for their content that a search engine penalizes them if they don't display that content prominently once the user lands on the site and instead display some advert orthogonal to what the user wanted.
matchu 11y ago
I'm not sure what makes this abuse. Curating the content you serve isn't just okay; it's one of the key value propositions of a search engine. The problem is when a content provider, for whatever reason, intentionally curates in a way that provides less value to the consumer.
- jbigelow76 11y ago
  So what about an OS vendor that "curates" a particular default browser and destroys a competing browser provider in the process? I seem to remember that happening a few years back. It's not so much the curating that's the problem, nobody would care if Duck Duck Go did it, the problem is with the regulators that view Google to be the only curator out there.

thrownaway2424 11y ago

What ad network is it that serves up ads that actually open up the iOS App Store, without having tapped on anything? That's super annoying.

cm2187 11y ago
My personal solution is to install the app, give it a very bad rating with the reason why I am pissed off as a comment and delete the app.
- dizzyviolet 11y ago
  Ohhh. I like that idea. I'm going to start doing that.
  - ianlevesque 11y ago
    Your installs are improving their App Store ranking anyway though!
    - cryptoz 11y ago
      Are they? I don't think so. And especially not if the all is uninstalled within minutes. Apple puts much more weight into the ranking than into 'total downloads' (which would be the only increasing metric in this case.
    - bduerst 11y ago
      Not if you uninstall right away.
lucidstack 11y ago
Ultimate Guitar, I'm looking at you. The worst.
- skeletonjelly 11y ago
  Their push to install the app is horrendous. It just keeps getting worse too!

neoCrimeLabs 11y ago

This is a little curmudgeonly, but this is how I feel... If your developers are not capable of making your website mobible friendly in 2015, any app they develop is likely worse. This is especially true when your app demands access to everything on my phone even though it doesn't need any of it to function.

roasm 11y ago
You're suggesting that you can make something as usable on a mobile browser as you can with a native app. That's just not true; if it were, there wouldn't be any native apps. For many use cases (games, highly interactive experiences, camera or microphone using app, etc.), a native app may just be better, and guiding users there might be a better experience and a better conversion funnel. Yes, you can make a website mobile friendly, but that doesn't mean it will be as good as the native app.
- stcredzero 11y ago
  Often, the native app is just as bad or worse! At least the just-as-bad native app didn't soak up your time and bandwidth!
  - ianstallings 11y ago
    If that were the case no one would ever install native apps. But the reality is given the choice, most people will use the app. I know this is a fact because mobile is my bread and butter. But if you need some evidence just go look at any of the analytics data that's out there. The majority of time spent on mobile by a user is using an app, with a much smaller percentage of time using the browser.
    - stcredzero 11y ago
      Most apps are ok, or at least no worse than the browser. Some are way worse. In no case does the interstitial take into account your momentary cost/benefit for downloading/installing or if the app is any good.

squiggy22 11y ago

Ha. Yet their advertising optimisation teams continue to tout the benefits of implementing an interstitial ad unit on mobile: https://developers.google.com/mobile-ads-sdk/docs/dfp/android/interstitial https://developers.google.com/mobile-ads-sdk/docs/dfp/androi... Edit. More here: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/mobile-ads-interstitial.html https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/mobile-ads-intersti... Left hand doesn't know what right hand is doing.

blowski 11y ago
As I understood the article, they're not discouraging all full page interstitial ads, just the ones which tout the mobile app of the website itself on first screen load.
blazespin 11y ago
As techchrunch pointed out, Google doesn't monetize iOS apps very well. Left and right hands are very much in sync.
oaktowner 11y ago
Those links appear to be about ads within apps, not on web pages. They can often be annoying, but that's different than interstitials on top of a mobile web site, right?
- manigandham 11y ago
  Yes, in-app is a very different environment from mobile web. Also they only want to stop full page ads pushing to download the app, not any other full page ad.

jbigelow76 11y ago

The most annoying aspect of app install interstitials is when the publisher doesn't offer a version of their app for your platform, which for us Windows Phone users is pretty much all of them. One more indignity I guess :)

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

smegel 11y ago

Which seems to be like 90% of them. Good guy Google for once.

unfunco 11y ago
Is it? It might seem like it's good guy Google, but Google is a company with shareholders and their mission objective (despite what they claim) is to maximise profit for their shareholders. They're the most powerful advertising agency in the world and they're punishing smaller advertising models. Don't get me wrong, I dislike advertising; I'd rather pay for content, but this strikes me as anti-competitive.

mark_l_watson 11y ago

Fantastic - so glad to see this. I use a browser to use facebook and twitter on my android phone. No I don't want to install an app, thanks! Still, G's new policy allows small install the app links, which is fine because a lot of people do want the app versions of web properties.

Fomite 11y ago

I expect them to get rid of the "You know you can install the App!" ads on Gmail for iOS first.

amelius 11y ago

You can say what you want about this benefiting the end user, but Google is acting as a market regulator now.

evboyle 11y ago

cough * cough * linkedin

mischanix 11y ago

These kinds of ads are the reason I leave javascript disabled on my phone. It prevents all kinds of annoyances and saves a significant amount of battery as well.

exodust 11y ago
Yes but that's annoying when you want JS enabled to view something like a slideshow on a web page. Swiping from one image to the other requires JS, and you need to go into settings and turn it on. Then remember to turn it off again. And you might not even know there's a gallery to view, because without JS the fallback might be a single image rather than a prompt to swipe the slideshow. When the simple act of swiping within a web page requires JS, you're crippling your own experience. Not to mention all the other JS-powered functions on a page. Adding things to a shopping cart etc, is much more user friendly with JS enabled.

prodmerc 11y ago

Does that mean the death of Tapatalk? 'cause I'm all in. Stop pestering me to install your stupid app, I like my browser just fine...

dtournemille 11y ago

Is it Google's "job" to police websites in this fashion?

MichaelGG 11y ago
Ffs yes. Google's entire point of existence is to rank sites. Literally that's the only function of a search engine.
exodust 11y ago
Google isn't banning websites, only denying them "mobile friendly" status, which naturally downranks them. Fair enough too. When you click a search result link, you want the information, not a full screen ad that's hard to close.

marak830 11y ago

I wonder if this has anything todo with apples push to block adverts to get people to make an app(and thus advertise that app on their site). Maybe i'm looking too much into this ;)

sharkweek 11y ago

As a user, I'm pro-getting rid of interstitial ads on mobile. But just for dissenting opinion, this definitely feels monopolistic. "Stay on the native web so we can sell more ads!" Maybe it's mutually beneficial for Google and its search users, but this is certainly the argument that's going to come from folks who are about to lose a ton of app downloads. http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-protecting-consumers-search-monopoly-228543 http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-pro...

matchu 11y ago
If anyone tries to make that argument, the counter will be simple: "We want developers to make native apps! That's why we're making App Indexing a thing." There's definitely some advantage to keeping people on the web, since App Indexing requires buy-in from content producers, but, if browsers start truly losing to native apps, Google are prepared. https://developers.google.com/app-indexing/ https://developers.google.com/app-indexing/

look_lookatme 11y ago

maybe they should punish their fucking AdX buyers that redirect people to the app stores for a change note: i work for a publisher and when an app store redirect comes through AdX or AppNexus and someone makes a complaint it is one of the worst, most helpless feelings. this is why people use adblock and there is nothing we can do because the networks are, still, an important part of our entire revenue stream

ksec 11y ago

May be only me, I dont really find those annoying, in fact i find them helpful when they tell me my favorite site has an App and I dont need to use Mobile Browser to Read.

exodust 11y ago
There are better ways to tell you about the app that don't annoy 99% of people.

werber 11y ago

Is this an announcement for the death of the unknown app, or Google give a big hug to using the browser more?

vacri 11y ago

I misread the title and was hoping that those .gif ads with misleading 'download', 'next', or 'inbox mail' buttons would be penalised. Ah, well...

ChuckMcM 11y ago

I wonder if this is more search defense than it is user experience work. One of the things web driven access gives you is access to the search traffic through that web site, once you go to the App all that traffic goes with it. Its clear that an app for everything is getting pushed hard by content providers.

jane_is_here 11y ago

How much longer before Google starts flagging Sourceforge as a malware site ?

JohnTHaller 11y ago
SourceForge distributes bundleware offer installers for only a handful of projects (I think 12) that have opted into their Dev Share program. Interesting Fact: A chunk of Google Chrome's install growth has been courtesy of the exact same type of bundleware offers with Adobe Flash, Java updates, and free antivirus installs/updates.

amolgupta 11y ago

what about the companies who dont have a mobile web version? All they have is a page to install app when opened on mobile? Do they show the desktop version or kill that page? eg. Flipkart and Myntra

hobarrera 11y ago
Those don't qualify as "mobile app ads" really. Those are actual websites that merely link to a mobile app.

FilterSweep 11y ago

So they're still not punishing sites that force redirect your mobile browser to a failed app download page I see. I shouldn't have to worry about my browser unintentionally trying to download the Draftkings app from a sports blog I'm reading.

manigandham 11y ago

Best to read this twitter thread: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893 https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893 This only applies to page covering ads for app installs. Not other interstitials. In fact Google recently did a study showing how 69% of people leave the page when faced with an interstitial [1], yet they also recently released an updated format for their own Google overlay ad [2] (although this is for apps). They don't want to lose web/search traffic to apps, but they make plenty of money running these formats themselves. A good summary of the various conflicts of interest is here [3]. 1. http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/07/google-case-study-on-app-download-interstitials.html http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/07/google-ca... 2. http://adwords.blogspot.com/2015/08/beautiful-new-designs-for-full-screen.html http://adwords.blogspot.com/2015/08/beautiful-new-designs-fo... 3. http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-protecting-consumers-search-monopoly-228543 http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-pro...

YokoZar 11y ago
Sorry, but what? What does an ad that shows between levels of angry birds on your phone have to do with ads blocking you from getting your search result? This sounds like some weird sort of misdirection attempt.
- manigandham 11y ago
  Edited for clarity: Google is claiming to do this to improve user experience, however: - they do these exact ads on every site they have - they arent stopping other interstitials so sites can be just as annoying on the first page - a site with great content should not be penalized for the site's own choices on ads - they're forcing a change that affects everyone else except them The PR signal doesnt match the execution. It's a monopolistic move and raises questions about their involvement in so many layers of the ads/web stack.
  - magicalist 11y ago
    The only thing you just said that made sense was: > the signal is that they don't want their search results to annoy users by showing them app install ads on the first hit which is absolutely great. Well done Google. Everything else in your post is weird and contradictory. They're apparently fine with advertising and non-annoying app install banners but they're going to make annoying app install banners less visible in search results. I'm really not seeing the problem. > It might be good for the consumer but that's just a side effect. See what I mean? So it's a great move and should be celebrated, but lets not congratulate Google on their motives? OK, I think we can all live with that.

illivah 11y ago

Dance websites! dance!

andoma 11y ago

First i thought the title read "Google Will Soon Start Pushing Mobile Sites That Use Annoying App Install Ads" :)

collyw 11y ago

Google is as bad as anyone when I open up stuff in my Ubuntu phone.

iamadatawhore 11y ago

bout time.

yoz-y 11y ago

Hm, I've rarely seen such pushes for app installs. I've mostly seen banner-like ads. However, I hope they will also start penalising websites that use overlays for mailing list submissions and account creation - before even giving you chance to read the article you came in for.

thespace123 11y ago

don't be evil

bibabo 11y ago

(I don't like these ads) 1. Apps can't be searched or content linked from Google.com 2. Apps don't show (as much?) Google ads 1 + 2 = Google penalty